


if i let go/will you leave?

by perennials



Category: Gintama
Genre: M/M, a great many things happen here, lacking in quality control
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-12
Updated: 2015-12-12
Packaged: 2018-05-06 07:14:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 7,427
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5407760
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/perennials/pseuds/perennials
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One took to the stars, one was swallowed by a demon, yet one stayed behind.</p><p>(Written for Ginzura week 2015 on tumblr.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. red yellow orange

**Author's Note:**

> Uploading these after it's ended because I was on vacation during the event and the last day of Ginzura week coincided with my last day in Japan. These were written in between getting chocolate parfaits and sinning in the doujinshi section at Mandrake, so please forgive the noticeably inconsistent quality and occasional error/glaring inconsistency.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Presenting to you, Ginzura week Day 1: "Childhood"

Gintoki likes sweet things, Gintoki likes Shouyou-sensei, and Gintoki likes Zura. Probably.

Zura likes rice balls, and Zura likes Shouyou-sensei (too, so maybe that’s to his advantage in some way), but does Zura like Gintoki? Probably not. Zura’s pea-sized brain couldn’t possibly process such complex feelings, he thinks with an (un)amused laugh.

He finds the smaller boy standing in a sea of red-yellow-orange attempting to sweep the yard early one morning, propped up against his broom with eyes lidded at a little below half mast. He’s so close to nodding off to dreamland that he doesn’t even notice when Gintoki approaches him, leaves and twigs crunching noisily underfoot as he plods his way over.

“Zura—,” Gintoki calls cheerfully into his ear.

“It’s not Zura, it’s Katsura!” He jumps some three feet into the air, but still manages to cough out his signature reply, albeit with a little less dignity than usual.

“You sweeping the yard or posing for a magazine shoot?”

“Sweeping the yard, of course! Unlike you, Gintoki, I actually take my chores seriously.”

Gintoki finds himself torn somewhere between the way the sun’s rays are bouncing off Zura’s silky, soot-black ponytail and the way his name rolls off Zura’s lips in two smooth parts (Gintoki,  _Gin-toki_ , and when Zura says it it sounds like raindrops against the tiles on the roof; ocean waves kissing sandy beaches), so he throws a fistful of dry leaves at him.

Zura returns the favor by stomping over to the culmination of his hour of hard work and giving the pile a mighty shove with his broom.

To his utmost irritation and surprise, Gintoki is showered in a flurry of crinkly yellow-red-orange. “You asshole!” He yells, spitting out a leaf and pulling a face.

“Shouyou-sensei says real samurai don’t use expletives!” Zura seems to be attempting another one of his lecture-esque teaching charades, but he’s cackling so gleefully that the edge is thoroughly taken off his words.

“What do _you_ know of how real samurai behave?” Gintoki aims a kick at what’s left of the leaf-pile.

“More than you do!” To Gintoki’s dismay, Zura dodges his attack and retreats behind a sturdy oak.

Grumbling under his breath, Gintoki creeps towards Zura with his arms full of leaves and a few more sticking messily out of his hair.

“Ha!” Gintoki shouts, leaping out and throwing his catch at Zura. The long-haired boy lets out a squeak of surprise and promptly topples over like an incredibly unstable domino tile, landing smack on top of Gintoki.

“You useless, heartless, stupid perm!” Zura mumbles helplessly into Gintoki’s haori. Gintoki’s breath catches in his throat for a fraction of a second- is he, could he possibly be,  _blushing_?

“Are you blushing?” Gintoki asks, because the filter between his thoughts and what he says chooses this particularly lovely moment in his life to malfunction at.

“Huh- I’m sorry, what?” Zura’s a flustered mess, tripping over his words and waving his arms agitatedly around and fumbling to get off of him. Oops. While Gintoki regrets, Zura manages to climb off Gintoki’s torso and close his fingers around the handle of his broom, after which he whacks the silver-haired boy expertly over the head.

And Gintoki thinks that he should probably get up and leave- no, he really  _should_  just go, but emboldened by this discovery that he hasn’t even confirmed is anything more than slightly wishful thinking, Gintoki decides to do something potentially  _life-threatening_  instead.

He sits up, puts his hands on either side of Zura’s face, and plants a kiss on the tip of his nose.

Gintoki walks away feeling oddly triumphant, leaving an utterly befuddled (and frozen, like a statue carved from stone) Katsura sitting in a pile of orange-yellow-red.

In the end it turns out their yard-trashing antics were sighted by someone (Gintoki’d bet his money on Chibisugi), and the pair are sentenced to yard-sweeping duty for the rest of the week by a quietly chuckling Shouyou-sensei.

Zura groans; Gintoki sticks his finger in his nose and looks idly out the window. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Very smol.  
> Have a good one folks.


	2. mother hen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ginzura week day 2: "War".

Zura is like a mother hen, with his soft feathers (hair) and warm (milk chocolate) eyes and reassuring words; all pleasant curves (the matter of his angular limbs and shoulders aside) and devoid of sharp edges, and somehow everything that this war is not. He is 1% Katsura and 99% Zura (not, it’s Katsura!), two parts hygiene obsessed and one part onigiri lover, three-fifths The Young Noble of Madness and two-fifths a childhood companion, lifelong acquaintance.

Sometimes Gintoki catches himself wishing it was the other way around, that Zura could be two-fifths military strategist and three-fifths best friend instead. Surely they could spare him another fifth of Zura, surely after all these years he deserves more than a few minutes of snatched, drowsy conversation snuck in between their heads hitting the rough hay stacks and their eyes slipping shut.

But the truth is, he knows that they need Katsura Kotarou more than he needs (pines after) Zura. The samurai,  _their_  samurai, need Zura’s battle tactics and careful planning to stay alive (and they don’t really need Sakata Gintoki either, no, they need  _Shiroyasha_  to sever heads when their own swords falter and miss, to bring back injured men instead of broken bodies, to do for themselves what they cannot).

(And surely this silly, inconsequential yearning of Gintoki’s is entirely one-sided, because this is a war, a  _war_ , a fierce, fiery, raging  _war_ ,  _get your head out of the gutter_ and back onto the battlefield, you  _fucking **idiot**_. Katsura-san can save tens of  _hundreds_  out there, and who can Zura save? You, you, only you.)

It’s fine this way though, Gintoki supposes. If Zura can keep ten more hearts beating in place of the one that’s stopped because of the way his goddamn haori keeps slipping just a fraction of an inch off his shoulder, then that’s certainly a success on his part. He’ll settle for the title of esteemed and trusty partner-in-combat(crime) or secondary character (because he can defend himself properly, of all things) off the battlefield, for watching Zura give out orders and instructions from afar (he should _really_  learn to tie his obi properly) through half-lidded eyes, finger shoved nonchalantly into his nose.

Then Zura returns from a night raid with a ragged hole in his stomach. 

Gintoki sees redblackwhite, pulse hammering, mouth dry, and Zura attempts to chuckle but just ends up breaking into chest-wracking coughs, stop,  _stop_ ,  _what the fuck happened Zura it’s not Zura it’s coughhackchoke Katsura Gintoki stop you’re hurting me **Gintoki-san please calm down he’s going to be okay we’re going to take him to the medic’s tent—**_

His head is spinning; he can’t breathe.

After a while, someone takes him by the shoulder and guides him into an enclosed space (tent?) with mellow, flickering lights and when the fog finally lifts from his thoughts the first thing Gintoki sees is Zura.

“Ahahaha, don’t worry, Kintoki! He’s not going to die just yet- they didn’t get any of his vital organs,” Sakamoto says from behind him, a touch quieter than usual. Gintoki doesn’t seem like he plans on replying (not even to yell at Sakamoto for getting his name wrong again), so he excuses himself, slipping out of the tent after a quick wave of his hand.

Gintoki takes Zura’s clammy hands and covers them with his own. Suddenly finding himself quite exhausted, his eyelids begin to droop, and just as his vision begins to blur Zura gives his hand a light squeeze.

As he turns his gaze to Zura’s face (the idiot is smiling for no apparent reason  _again_ ), the tight ball of anxiety in the pit of his stomach finally unravels and (somehow) he can breathe again. Gintoki squeezes back.

“O-ouch,” Zura winces slightly as he pushes himself up to a sitting position.

“Oi, you’re still hurt!”

“I’m fine, Gintoki,” he nestles himself more comfortably against the headboard, “the question is, are you?”

Gintoki opens his mouth, seems to decide against speaking, closes it, and swallows. Sighing, he leans forward and gently pulls the smaller man into a hug, being careful not to press against his wound. To his surprise, Zura doesn’t protest, instead circling Gintoki’s waist with his arms and resting his chin on his shoulder.

Gintoki thinks that perhaps he doesn’t need three-fifths of Zura anymore- just his two-fifths and the simple knowledge that he is still breathing and moving and  _alive_  is good enough for him.  

(And Zura is soft and warm and soothing like a mother hen- like home.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think I may have written half of this on the train and it is questionable but I hope you enjoyed it, nonetheless.  
> Feedback, kudos, and comments are cool.  
> Have a good one folks.


	3. this was never a battlefield to begin with

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Presenting to you Ginzura week Day 4: "Yorozura (Yorozuya + Zura)"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I bet you were expecting cosplay (which is the prompt for day three), but I couldn't for the life of me think of something related to cosplay that wasn't either 1. incredibly stupid and lame or 2. incredibly NSFW, so here's day 4 instead.  
> I did draw something for day 3 though, if you're interested in that.   
> ( http://corpsentry.tumblr.com/post/134629843484/ginzura-week-day-3-cosplay )

Gintoki is like high tides; unstable, uneasy- constantly in motion.

He tenses at the twist of a doorknob, the rustling of a sheaf of papers, the slip of a tongue (pulse quickening and mouth running dry)- muscles clenching all too familiarly.

He knows nothing’s going to hurt him, of course. Of course he knows. He knows (he does, doesn’t he?). But plain, simple knowledge is not enough to combat earthquake tremors and shaky, fluttering heartbeats, and Gintoki knows that, too. There are some things that cannot be forgotten, like the glint of steel and the tang of iron and the soft rebound of cold metal against flesh.

(Gintoki could sit and list things forever and ever; he is good at listing things, good at staying awake and letting his thoughts drift out the open window and letting time slip through his fingers like quicksand.)

Still there are other things that linger on in his thoughts, folding themselves into the crevices of his mind and stubbornly refusing to leave like the remnants of a wad of toffee clinging desperately to the back of your teeth.

—He remembers cool, summer nights, straw bedding that reeked of horse shit, smiling faces alight with admiration instead of darkened with fear and suspicion.

—He remembers the pure elation of stumbling upon a hidden spring, the pleasant sensation of clean (for once!) water streaming down his back, Takasugi’s high-pitched shrieks and Sakamoto’s (familiar) rumbling laughter.

—He remembers tangling his fingers in smooth raven locks, milk chocolate-brown eyes looking up to meet his, snatching brief kisses when heads were (conveniently) turned and gazes were elsewhere.

(He remembers Zura.)

And above everything else, soldiers,  _his_  soldiers, falling like dominoes, dropping like stones, his heart of shaved ice being scraped away at layer by thin, fragile layer. Broken bodies and bones and hearts, glazed eyes and deafening thunderstorms, losing his closest comrades to monsters that even he couldn’t slay.

One took to the stars, one was swallowed by a demon— one stayed behind.

(The rest weren’t as lucky.)

_Click_. The sound of the entrance door being drawn open winds its way into his ears, but Gintoki is still living in the past, distractedly waltzing with some smiling, crimson-eyed stranger. Stomach plummeting and heart in mouth, he reaches instinctively for his bokuto, tightening calloused fingers around its worn, familiar hilt.

Footsteps— more than one person, from the likes of it— gradually grow louder and louder, until they’re right outside the living room. Gintoki’s pulse quickens, hammering furiously, painfully, and he tenses in silent anticipation.

Then the sliding door is pushed aside, and in strides a girl with brilliant blue eyes— Kagura.

(Ah, yes. This was never a battlefield to begin with, was it?)

“Zura, he’s here all right,” she calls over her shoulder.

“As I have said  _many_  times before, it’s not Zura, it’s  _Katsura_ ,” Zura says in exasperation, stepping inside with three plastic bags on each hand.

(They’ve long since laid down their armor, traded blades for half-empty wallets, hard blows for the pleasant buzz of alcohol.)

“Katsura-san, you can leave everything on the coffee table. We’ll handle the rest.”

“Gin-chan, we bought groceries! And Zura got me extra sukonbu—”

“And Otsuu’s new album—”

“Only because they begged me with those puppy-eyes…”

“Oi, Gin-chan? You listening?”

“Gintoki?” The plastic bags hit the ground with a resounding clunk, and in the blink of an eye Zura is in front of Gintoki, his slender hands on the other man’s shoulders and his searching gaze piercing. He stares long and hard at Gintoki, (and maybe Zura can see the ghosts in his eyes) before giving his cheek a hard pinch.

“Ouch— Huh? What? Oh, it’s just you, Zura,” Gintoki manages to cough out a stilted response, wincing.

“It’s not Zura, it’s Katsura.” Zura’s tone is chiding (as usual), but his eyes betray a hint of relief.

“Did something happen to Gin-san?” Shinpachi pokes his head in and asks.

“Nope, ’m fine,” Gintoki insists, rising unsteadily to his feet. He sways on the spot for a moment and stumbles, but Katsura and Kagura (lightning fast, as always) are there to catch him before he hits the ground. A second later, Shinpachi slips inside and puts a hand to Gintoki’s forehead.

“A fever,” Shinpachi says, quite seriously.

“Fever?” Kagura enquires.

“Fever it is,” Zura finishes decisively.

They haul Gintoki into his room, unroll the futon, and dump him rather unceremoniously on it. A towel is obtained, along with a bucket of water, and finally after a good twenty-odd minutes there is peace and quiet in the Yorozuya apartment.

Gintoki peels his eyelids open and sees a black wig hovering in his peripheral vision.

“Zura.”

_Sigh_.

“Where’d Shinpachi and Kagura go?”

“They’re off getting your medicine. You don’t keep anything stocked in this house, do you?”

“Oh.”

“You were thinking about the war again.” It’s not a question, but rather a statement.

Gintoki shrugs, and Zura sighs again. (Zura is always sighing, he seems to be in a constant state of exasperation and disappointment.)

“You can talk to us, you know?”

“Yeah.”

“Good.” Shifting slightly, Zura lowers himself to the futon and presses a kiss to his forehead, his lips cool against Gintoki’s clammy skin. 

“Get well soon, you stupid perm.” He glances behind him, a small smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “Well, then. I’ll be going now.”

Pulling himself to a standing position, Zura exits the room just as Kagura and Shinpachi rush back in.

“Gin-chan! Ice cream!”

“It wasn’t my idea, Kagura insisted—”

“Is the towel getting hot? I’ll change it.”

“No, Kagura, stop, you’re splashing water all over his clothes!”

"What? Oh, oops."

“Gin-san, I’m so sorry, Kagura’s just—”

“Kagura what? I’m the one who thought to change his towel at all! You heartless, useless pair of glasses!”

_“What sort of insult is that?”_

Gintoki looks up (blinking ice-cold water out of his eyes) just in time to catch the wave of Zura’s hand and the silent good-bye he mouths.

Kagura is like a powerful whirlpool (loud and dangerous and very much alive), Shinpachi is like quiet waves lapping at sandy white shores (concealing poisonous jellyfish and various other terrifying creatures), but Zura is like low tides; unyielding, unwavering- constant.

(And Zura is good and strong and soft and smells like expensive floral shampoo and soy sauce, Zura is his.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You will notice after reading this that it follows the same format of angst, brooding, other characters, a fever, and comforting things. I am sorry. This is something I did not notice while writing and editing. Holidays are distracting.  
> Feedback, comments, and kudos are cool.  
> Have a good one folks.


	4. the disadvantages of rooming with a scatter-brained wig head

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ginzura week Day 5: "Cats"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AU in which Gintoki and Katsura are roommates of some sort, I suppose.

“A cat,” Gintoki deadpans.

Katsura nods tentatively, cradling the large basket on his lap a little closer to his chest.

“A cat,” he repeats.

Katsura’s eyes twinkle somewhat uncertainly.

“You  _bought_  a  _cat_.“ 

"Well, not exactly  _bought_ ,” Katsura twiddles his fingers, looking guilty, “I kinda, uh,  _found_  them in a  _cardboard_  box on the  _side_  of the road.” He describes their situation with a great deal of emphasis on words like “found” and “cardboard”, as though he hopes that Gintoki will somehow be swayed by his providing details on their sad predicament and take pity on them.

However, to Katsura’s utter dismay, he latches onto an entirely different word. “ _They_?” Gintoki asks incredulously. “There’s more than  _one_?”

The long-haired boy laughs nervously, absentmindedly fingering the collar of his uniform. “I couldn’t possibly take just one or two, and leave the rest behind…”

“Oi, oi—”

“…and they had those eyes, the ones that make you want to gobble them right up…”

_“You’re a danger to society.”_

“…and they were all squished up in that sad little box!”

“Exactly _how many_  did you bring back?”

Katsura ducks his head like a shoujo manga heroine and looks up at Gintoki through a curtain of silky black hair. “Twelve,” he whispers.

Gintoki’s face scrunches up like a crumpled ball of paper and he falls backwards onto the bed, exhausted. “Look, Zura. I know you like animals, possibly even more than you like me,” he starts.

Katsura cuts in, “it’s not Zura, it’s Ka—”

“But look. You live off thirty bucks a week, share a  _tiny-ass_  room with a guy who’s practically broke, and I dunno if you remember this but we’re  _sort of not allowed to keep pets here.”_

“No one else has to know,” Katsura responds indignantly. Gintoki gets up and drags him down by the ear, the cat basket tumbling onto the soft covers.

“But  _I’ll_  have to know, and  _I’ll_  have to live with it,” he groans, tugging agitatedly at Katsura’s ear.

Katsura gently pries his hand off. “It’s okay, Gintoki! I’ll take good care of them,” he says reassuringly and smiles, a big, stupid, innocent smile that almost makes Gintoki forget how much of a  _dumbass_  he’s being right now. A purple cat with red patches under its eyes (looking more alien than feline, really) leaps out of the basket and begins enthusiastically pawing at Gintoki’s half-undone tie, while a jovial brown cat sporting an afro nestles itself in his hair and starts cackling loudly ( _when the hell could_ cats _cackle, anyway?_ ).

“Haa? When did I agree to let you keep them? Gin-san’s not half as nice as you think he is,” he grumbles, trying to pry the squirming creature off his chest.

“She likes you.” Katsura rolls over sideways and props himself up on one elbow, just in time for a dark purple cat smelling suspiciously like Yakult to swipe a paw down the length of his arm. It leaves a bloody streak in its wake— one more wound to join the scratches and bruises that pepper his arms.

“You little asshole,” Gintoki mutters incredulously, grabbing Katsura’s attacker by the scruff of its neck and tossing it aside, only for it to be replaced with an unenergetic sandy-furred cat within seconds. He makes to sit up, but is distracted by the pair of odd-looking cats (is one of them wearing glasses?) that pounces on him and pushes him back down onto the mattress, where Katsura is still adoringly showering his assailants with (very much unrequited) love. They’re batting at him with their little bean paws, some more vigorously than others, while the idiot just laughs and laughs and laughs (with cherry-red ears), blissfully unaware of the animosity they (quite obviously) harbor towards him. He’s covered from head to toe in thin, cat-claw scratches, but Katsura’s beaming like a glorious ray of sunshine.

“Maybe we could keep one or two,” Gintoki mumbles slowly, reluctantly. He prods half-heartedly at one’s cheek.  _Yup, those are_ definitely _glasses on that little guy’s nose._

“Hmm? Sorry, I couldn’t hear you over all their adorable little meows,” Katsura calls cheerfully over his shoulder.

_That bastard_. “I said—”

Before he can complete his sentence, the Yakult cat from earlier on idles over to where Gintoki is still sprawled on the bed and nonchalantly plants its butt in his hair. The next thing he knows, there is a sickening warmth spreading to his scalp and a putrid smell seeping into his nostrils. He wrinkles his nose, swallowing the sudden urge to hurl.  _No, no, you did_ not  _just— surely this is all just a dream_  (but the sourness in the air is very real)—  _I’m going to_  fucking kill _Zura—_

“Meow,” the Yakult cat remarks passively.

“Gintoki?”

“Nothing. It’s nothing.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What a drastic change in mood.  
> Have a good one folks.


	5. i have a reason to come back now

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ginzura week day 6: "promise"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies in advance for the quality drop.

“Good morning, Gintoki.” Katsura slides a perfectly golden-brown, sukonbu-topped pancake onto the plate in Kagura’s outstretched hands.

Gintoki mumbles back an incoherent ‘good morning’ and zombie-walks into the bathroom, carelessly yanking the door shut. He takes a piss, brushes his teeth, washes his face, then steps back out, feeling a little less like one of the walking dead. Kagura is sitting at the kitchen table, enthusiastically shoving whole pancakes into her mouth, while Katsura is still flipping pancakes at the stove. Gintoki ambles over to him and peers over his shoulder.

“It’s pancakes today, huh?” Gintoki observes.

“Kagura wanted to try something different,” Katsura says by way of explanation.

“They taste extra good with sukonbu!” Kagura chimes in cheerfully, expertly spearing another pancake for emphasis.

Gintoki kneels down and fumbles around in the cabinet for a second before triumphantly returning with a clean plate in one hand. He picks languidly at the strap of Katsura’s apron. “Did you make my share?”

“Of course.” Katsura shrugs his hand off and drops a stack of (sukonbu-free, to his relief) pancakes on his plate. Gintoki makes a satisfied humming sound before plopping down in a chair at the kitchen table.

“Ew, who puts  _red bean paste_  on pancakes?” She makes a face.

“Says the one who regularly dumps heaps of  _dried seaweed_ on a bunch of perfectly good, fluffy pancakes,” Gintoki says dryly, pinching her cheek until she makes to bite his finger off, at which point he tactfully withdraws his hand.

Katsura chuckles.

It’s been a week since the wanted terrorist slipped in through the window in their toilet and declared he’d keep an eye on Gintoki (who’d recently returned, very much harmed, from another violent brawl of sorts), and he’s become something like an unofficial member of the household, having settled comfortably into the role of cook and cleaner (and perhaps motherly figure, in a way).

“How are your wounds?” Katsura enquires over the sound of running water.

“Pretty much all healed up.” Gintoki swallows the last of his pancakes and heads for the fridge.

As he walks by, Gintoki’s shoulder brushes lightly against Katsura’s. “That’s good.” Katsura replies.

Kagura continues chewing loudly on the remainder of her pancakes, Gintoki chugs strawberry milk straight out of the carton on the couch while flipping idly through today’s horoscope readings, and Katsura washes the dishes.

“Oh, I forgot to tell you that Shinpachi’s not coming today. Word of the gorilla’s plan to propose to Otae-san  _again_  got out, and he said he had to be there to protect her from the pervert’s dangerous advances,” Kagura says thoughtfully through a mouthful of pancakes. “He dropped by earlier and took Sadaharu with him for extra defense points, or something.” Gintoki grunts, unimpressed. Katsura slips discreetly into the living room and sits down next to him.

Katsura leans against Gintoki, his arm pressing into the other’s side. His eyes slide shut and his head falls onto his shoulder and Gintoki almost thinks the other man’s fallen asleep, until Katsura opens his mouth and comments quite mildly, “it doesn't look like it'll rain today.”

“I guess so?” Gintoki scratches absentmindedly at a spot behind his left ear.

“It’s perfect for going to the beach,” Katsura continues pleasantly.

“Oi, oi, you trying to hint at something there? We’re not going to the beach just because a stupid wig head suddenly feels—”

“Speaking of going, I think it’s time for me to get going,” Katsura cuts him off.

Kagura wails something about there being  _no more pancakes left_  at the exact same moment that Gintoki coughs out (perhaps a little louder than he’d like to admit) a startled “what?”

“My purpose here has been fulfilled and your stomachs have been filled, what more could you ask for?” Katsura cocks his head to one side, his hair tumbling over his shoulders.

“But what the heck does  _going to the beach_ have to do with you  _leaving_? They’re two totally different things!” Gintoki asks incredulously, to which the other only shrugs his shoulders.

Kagura trots over, eyes bright with curiosity. “Gin-chan, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing. I’m leaving, is all,” Katsura answers in Gintoki’s stead.

“Oh, no.” Kagura’s eyes start to water. “That means I’ll have to go back to either having eggs-on-rice for breakfast, or dog food!” She exclaims dramatically, her voice trembling slightly.

“I thought you  _liked_  eggs-on-rice.” Gintoki points an accusatory finger at Kagura.

“Zura’s cooking is better. And he’s actually  _nice_ , plus he lets me do whatever I want.” She pouts, the tears very suddenly (and noticeably) absent from her rosy cheeks.

“Well, I, uh,” Katsura stutters, so visibly flattered that even the fact that someone’s mispronounced his name again goes flying over his head. Gintoki snorts. “A-anyway! I must be going, to, you know, the dawn of a new Edo!” He announces resolutely with every intention of leaving, but before he can take even one step towards the door Kagura latches onto his arm and wraps her legs around him, gorilla-style.

“Promise you’ll come back?” She looks up at Katsura with big, hopeful eyes.

“Of course I will,” Katsura says reassuringly. Gintoki blinks at him.

“Promise?” Kagura holds out her left pinky.

Katsura hooks his pinky around hers and replies very seriously, “I promise.” Kagura beams.

“And you, Gintoki!” Katsura turns to Gintoki, who’s sprawled on the couch, with Kagura still hanging off of him like some particularly heavy (and happy) tree vine. “Please try not to get yourself hurt so terribly often! People worry, you know.”

“Yeah, yeah, I got it,” Gintoki mutters, distractedly digging around in his ear with his pinky. Despite his nonchalant tone of voice, his lips are curved up in a small smile. Holding out his pinky finger, he offers, “want to pinky-promise on it too?”

Katsura recoils, shooting him a disbelieving, horror-filled look. “No, thank you!”

Kagura sneers at him. “Gin-chan’s  _disgusting_ ,” she crows gleefully.

Gintoki looks on as Katsura painstakingly pries Kagura off of him (and the fact that she’s clinging to him with all her might and cackling at the same time doesn’t help much), too busy recording the entire scene in his mind’s eye to offer any assistance. Katsura finally succeeds in detaching Kagura, and she affectionately gives his hair one last (painful, from the way he winces) tug before skipping into the next room.

“I'll see you around.” Katsura nods in his direction.

Gintoki offers him a goofy smile. “Yeah."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I tried. The ending is unsatisfactory but I really couldn't think of a better way to end things.  
> Have a good one folks.


	6. we are/everything is/temporary

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ginzura week day 7: "Modern AU"

There’s a ghost living in Gintoki’s house. He moved in last night. Came knocking on the door at half past three in the morning with rain drops trickling down his cheeks and a tempest in his eyes and snow in his hair; asked if he had room to spare for one extra soul.

“I’m a ghost,” he said, “we don’t take up much space.”

Gintoki, in response, frowned at the blurry figure standing on his doorstep, wished he’d thought to grab his glasses before he went downstairs (though, to be fair, ghosts rarely drop by in the dead of the night, and he simply hadn’t been prepared), and asked him if he could afford rent.

The ghost shook his head.

Gintoki let the ghost in, anyway. He was twenty-seven and spent his days typing away at a computer while looking aimlessly out frosted windows— he figured the presence of one more specter wandering the hallways wouldn’t bother him that much. Besides, the ghost sounded sad. Gintoki could understand sad.

He offered the ghost a drink, as all polite people do to their guests (dead or alive), but the ghost declined with a small shake of his head.

“Well, if you’re just going to hang around and stare at the ceiling, ’m going back to bed,” Gintoki muttered through a muffled yawn. “There’re extra blankets in the cupboard under the stairs, if you need ‘em.”

The ghost whispered a thank you to his retreating form, because (surprising though it may be) ghosts need blankets, too.

-

“So. You’re a ghost,” Gintoki says in the morning through a mouthful of sugar and Lucky Charms. Warm sunlight streams in through the windows, painting the sparsely-furnished living room in a myriad of cheerful yellows and reds. Gintoki’s hair is speckled with flecks of gold, while the ghost’s soot-black head of silky hair only reflects the dullest (gloomiest) of shines. He is dressed in a plain gray shirt and jeans- not exactly an attire that screams “undead”, but what does Gintoki know of the afterlife, really? Maybe the times have changed, maybe ghost trends have changed.

The ghost nods.

“Got a name?”

“Katsura.” The ghost— Katsura— shifts uneasily on the couch.

“Too long.” Gintoki taps his spoon against the edge of his bowl. “Zura.”

For a split-second it looks like Katsura wants to say something, but instead he lets out a defeated sigh and dejectedly sinks further into the sofa arm.

“Now, Zura, I’ve got a manuscript I need to send in by tonight, so I’d really appreciate it if you’d refrain from doing ghost-like things like banging on furniture and howling unnecessarily, a'rright?” Gintoki picks himself off the chair and dumps his bowl and spoon in the sink. “Have fun.”

Katsura calls after him, “it’s not Zura, it’s Katsura.”

He gets up and starts to wash the dishes.

-

There’s a ghost living in Gintoki’s house, one who’s grown incredibly fond of perusing his sprawling literary collection. Granted, his skyscraper bookshelves  _are_  probably the most impressive things he owns, but Gintoki is still quite baffled by Katsura’s enthusiasm.

The old two-seater from the living room has been moved (with permission) into Gintoki’s study, and Katsura has settled into the habit of spending most of each day curled up on the peeling (but still comfortable, arguably) piece of furniture. On a regular day he’ll quietly slip inside after Gintoki finishes breakfast, select a few books from the shelves, then read on the couch until Gintoki gets up to make dinner.

As he’d expected, Gintoki isn’t particularly bothered by Katsura’s presence in his study. He still kicks his feet up on the table and spins around in his chair (when the sentences won’t connect), still takes ridiculously long (snack) breaks, and still smokes and types at the same time as though it is a perfectly natural thing to do. He treats Katsura like a specter (which he is, really), not so much as sparing him a glance from his desk most days, but Katsura looks up from time to time and watches Gintoki work with a curious gleam in his eyes.

A few days later it seems he finally realizes Katsura exists in his study, or maybe Gintoki simply feels friendly for once, because he stands up and slouches his way over to the sofa. He rests his arms on the sofa’s back and peers lazily over Katsura’s shoulder.

“What’re you reading?”

“Gintama.”

“Haa? Of all the famous classics and New York Times bestsellers I have, you’re reading  _Gintama_?”

“I figured I’d give it a chance— it looked somewhat interesting.”

“Well… How is it?”

“Not very good. The premise is sloppy and badly put-together, the humor is outdated and repetitive, and the characters are plain stupid.”

_Ah—_

Nostalgia knocks on the door of Gintoki’s heart and it sings, an ugly, off-key rendition of Gintama’s fourteenth ending theme. For a second it feels like there is a coil of wire in the pit of his belly wound up too tight for his comfort, like the wire cutters are lodged in his throat and crimson is dripping into his stomach. Then the moment passes, and Gintoki finds that he can breathe again.

_That’s almost exactly what she said when she first read Gintama—_ the words are doing pirouettes on the tip of his tongue, all Gintoki has to do is open his mouth and he’s sure they’ll leap right out, but he doesn’t want them to, doesn’t want Katsura (doesn’t want this peculiar, wayward ghost) to find out about wind chime laughter and cold, rainy nights. Katsura thinks he is aloof smiles and cynical, lazy comebacks, and that is exactly what Sakata Gintoki is now.

(Right? Right.)

Gintoki forces out a chuckle and a “oh, is that so?” and hastily retreats to his work table.

-

Katsura isn’t the only ghost that nips at his heels and trails behind him wherever he goes.

Gintoki’s house wasn’t always this quiet (graveyard; shipwreck) or this empty (and maybe that’s why it still feels too big). Once upon a time he wasn’t a floater, a free drifter- once upon a time Gintoki was bound to the ground with extra-sturdy sukonbu strips and metal-framed glasses, tied down to something,  _someone_  apart from strawberry parfaits and cigarettes.

There were others, living, breathing, laughing, snickering others. But they left.

One, two, three, four, all out the door!  _Five, six, seven, eight, way too fucking late._ Vanished in a flurry of red and blue fairy dust, and some of it must have gotten into his eyes that day because it rained, streamed in rivulets down his cheeks, stained his sleeves with heartbreak. It must have hurt, poor thing,  _of course it hurt,_  it stung like a third-degree burn, like a punch to the gut, like a sad (reluctant), apologetic good-bye. So he sat with wide, empty goldfish-eyes on the study room floor for two hours with a shriveled cigarette on the ground and a shriveled prune for a heart; sat in the bathtub for three holding shriveled fingers up to his face and waiting for footsteps and a knock on his front door; stayed in there for seven more because he fell asleep, woke up with a dizzying fever and sweat-slicked skin and frosted lips.

He was cold (hard as ice) and coal (black-hearted) and unwanted and unneeded and he was alone. (Again.)

(And he thinks that his shriveled prune-heart, frozen over with tears and littered with angry red fault lines, is too small (too ugly)- there is no  _room_ for  _more_.)

-

Gintoki is leaning against the doorway looking remarkably like a vogue magazine model, without the enigmatic smile but with the same piercing look in his eyes. “What sort of ghost are you, actually? You can hold physical objects, but you can’t do basic ghost stuff like walk through walls- that’s pretty pathetic.”

Katsura turns the page, delicate fingers careful not to bend the sheets. “I know as much as you do. Which is to say, nothing at all.”

He furrows his eyebrows. “Surely you’ve got some sort of idea.”

Shrug. “Plot convenience, maybe.”

“You’re a lame ghost,” Gintoki replies, setting his mug on the desk and flopping down beside Katsura.

For a while, they sit, unspeaking, with nothing but the sound of rustling pages and level breathing between them. The temperature dipped overnight, so despite the warmth from the heater and the blanket he’s drawn around his shoulders, Gintoki feels a chill down to his bones.

“That means I should be able to touch you, too, right?” He murmurs thoughtfully. To his surprise, there is no reply. He turns his head only to find that his undead companion has seemingly fallen asleep. Katsura’s head is against the armrest and his hair has fanned out around him in a messy circle, tumbling over his shoulders and the edge of the sofa like clumps of silk.

“So ghosts can sleep too, huh?” Gintoki remarks amusedly. Katsura’s eyelashes are unnaturally long- they’re practically kissing his cheeks. He’s almost like an angel. Gintoki chuckles. Well, it’s not like he’s human to begin with. ‘Angel’ probably wouldn’t be too far off.

He reaches over and lightly pokes Katsura’s nose. His skin is smooth and supple. Gintoki is reminded of a cool spring breeze and tapioca pearls.  _So this is what a ghost’s skin feels like._  His interest piqued, Gintoki lifts a lock of hair and watches as it slips through his fingers.  _Soft_. He ghosts a hand along his jaw and down his jugular and Katsura… Shivers?  _What if—_ Without stopping to think about the possible implications (as he should, really- twenty-seven and still moving without considering the rules of cause and effect? Laughable.), he bends down and brushes his lips lightly, ever so lightly, against Katsura’s.  _Sweet—_

Katsura’s eyes fly open.

Gintoki pulls away, his expression neutral. “Hey.”

_“Did you just—”_

He stares at Katsura passively with hooded eyes.

_“Did I just—”_

Gintoki picks half-heartedly at a hangnail, his gaze still resting languidly on Katsura.

Katsura flees the room, flying through the door without bothering to so much as alight his fingers on the doorknob.

-

“I kissed a ghost the other day,” Gintoki says conversationally while Hasegawa rings up his carton of strawberry milk at the 24-hour convenience mart downstairs.

The older man sounds vaguely intrigued, but unsurprised. “How was it?”

Gintoki flicks his gaze out the fogged-up window and eyes something across the street. Hasegawa puts the carton in a plastic bag, slides it across the counter to him.

“Cold.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you overlook the fact that Katsura's existence is basically one huge question mark I suppose it counts as a modern AU of sorts. Sorts.  
> I try.  
> Have a good one folks.


	7. if i take your hand/will you stay?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Presenting to you, Ginzura week Day 8: "Future".

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cliches galore.  
> Life's (not) a shoujo manga.  
> Not beta-read. Sorry.

“What are you going to do after you graduate, Gintoki?” Katsura asks lightly as he leans against the railing, chin propped up on his elbows.

“Oi, oi, don’t go off turning this into some high school drama about _discovering our true selves_ and all that crap when you know we only stopped the car so Sakamoto wouldn’t puke all over the seats,” Gintoki mutters around his strawberry lollipop.

“The sky is beautiful tonight,” Katsura proclaims poetically, thoroughly ignoring him.

“You know what else is beautiful?” Gintoki grumbles, “the fact that we left two absolutely  _hammered_ idiots to wander the woods by themselves because you couldn’t stand to have  _twigs and leaves in your hair_.”

Katsura huffs irritably. “They said they’d be fine.”

From somewhere in the far-off distance, someone yelps, sharp and distinctly unamused, and it’s followed by hysterical, hyena-like laughter that bubbles up like water from a brook. Gintoki throws an arm around Katsura and gives him a lazy thumbs up. Not hesitating in the slightest, the smaller boy shoves Gintoki off and shuffles further down the length of the railing. “You didn’t answer my question,” comes the sulking reply from a few meters away.

“Eh, I dunno,” Gintoki says, sounding twice as bored as he usually does.

“Still?” Katsura tosses his sigh out towards the rhinestones glittering in the night sky, but it falls short, slips soundlessly into the ocean rumbling beneath their feet.

“Well, it’s not like I’ve got a future worth fighting for to begin with.” Gintoki looks skyward, his hair whispering against the collar of his uniform. “My grades aren’t perfect like yours are, and I’ve no special talents like Takasugi or Sakamoto, so it doesn’t matter, really, if I stay or head somewhere else.” He narrows his eyes and squints up at the  ~~moon~~ convenience store milk pudding, because for some unfathomable reason it keeps fading in and out of focus like some tacky magician’s disappearing trick gone wrong, and it's looking much paler than it usually is. It must be the beer, he thinks, he doesn’t usually have more than one or two. Sakamoto must’ve convinced him through some nasty form of underhanded bribery to do it.

When Gintoki pulls his gaze back down to Earth, Katsura has returned to his original spot beside him. 

“What about a future with us in it?” Katsura’s eyes are  ~~half-closed~~ half-open, his gaze lingering on the waves below.

"You guys'll be fine without me." Gintoki yawns. The lollipop stick falls out of his mouth and lands in the grass.

"What about you?"

Gintoki finds that he has neither an answer nor the slightest idea what to say, so he keeps his mouth shut and presses his shoulder into Katsura’s. Sometimes actions speak louder than words, and though Gintoki isn’t really sure what sort of message he’s trying to get across he hopes that Katsura understands at least a small part of it.

Toeing the ground with one foot, Katsura flings a clump of dirt in Gintoki’s direction. “Your shoelaces are untied.”

He squats down and is about to save his fraying laces from the clutches of pure dirt evil when Katsura yanks at a tuft of his hair, resulting in him jumping involuntarily. “Gintoki! Gintoki! It’s a shooting star!” Katsura twitters excitedly.

“Huh? Oh, cool.” Katsura’s shooting star is burning, almost too bright for his eyes, shining like a beacon against the dark cerulean of the night.

Katsura claps his hands together and presses them to his face, squeezing his eyes shut. He opens his mouth and starts to speak, but no matter how hard Gintoki strains his ears he can't make out what Katsura is saying. "Done." Katsura's eyes fly open just in time to see it disappear.

"You just made a wish, didn't you?" Gintoki raises an eyebrow.

"Yeah."

"What, you're the sort that believes in that kind of thing?"

"It doesn't hurt to try." Katsura offers a ~~sad~~ small smile with his eyes  ~~shining~~ twinkling like diamonds, and Gintoki has to fight to resist the urge to shield his own from the glare. 

"I guess."

They lapse into a familiar, comfortable silence, one they've slipped into countless times over the years.

"The university accepted my application," Katsura says quietly. 

Gintoki nods without asking which university, exactly, he's talking about. They both know which one it is, anyway. It's been talked about, mentioned in passing, casually brought up while they goofed around at Mcdonalds enough times that even Gintoki can remember its name.

"They offered me a scholarship, too."

It’s one-something in the morning and Gintoki really wants nothing more than to lie down and sleep the rest of eternity away, but all of a sudden there is something shining more brilliantly than all the stars in the sky put together and he realizes, with a start, that this light could very well disappear— no, that this light probably  _is_ disappearing, going somewhere far, far away, where even ~~he~~ shooting stars cannot reach.

"Hey, Zura, about—" Gintoki is stopped mid-sentence because Katsura yanks a little roughly on his collar and the next thing he knows Katsura has pulled him into a kiss. Katsura tastes like skittles and coke and the milk pudding from the convenience store down the street, like unspoken words and bitter longing and a profound sadness; his eyes are closed and ~~Gintoki wishes they were wide open~~ doesn't Katsura know that if he doesn't shine like a blazing comet they'll both freeze? Their hearts will dry up like shriveled prunes, become ugly and twisted and empty and _cold_. Then even that desperate thought fades away, vanishing like a tacky magician's magic trick gone right, and is replaced by the burning sensation of Katsura's lips on his, hot and heavy and soft and searching all at the same time. Warmth washes over Gintoki in waves and Katsura has his hands tangled in his curls and Katsura's hair is all messed up ~~because of Gintoki~~ but he doesn't say anything, just kisses him harder and fiercer like he's someone different, like they're different people, not a small-town boy with his sights set on the bustling city and a guy with his head in a bush by the side of the road, not a ~~believer~~ hard worker and a drifter, not a shooting star and a black hole.

Katsura stops, suddenly, as if he was a machine and a switch had been flipped, slumps over and drops his head on Gintoki's shoulders, his arms still around his neck. He doesn't need to say anything else- once again, both of them know what Katsura means to say, and maybe actions really do speak louder than words sometimes.

"When are you leaving?" Gintoki mumbles into his hair. He can't see Katsura's eyes anymore. 

"Next Sunday. The five o'clock train from platform seven."

"Oh."

"You know, if you wanted, I could—" Katsura stops.

Shooting stars belong in the sky, not smothered by darkness. Not here.

Katsura deserves better than convenience store milk pudding. 

"We're not—" Gintoki finds himself cut off again, he's always getting cut off, he can't seem to fucking get anything across tonight, by a burst of "AHAHAHA"s echoing out of the woods.

“GIMME BACK MY PANTS, YOU—” Takasugi comes flying into the clearing clad in nothing but a pair of purple boxers with black hearts printed on, Sakamoto following unsteadily in his wake; Katsura doubles over laughing and Gintoki snorts, chokes on air and goes down with him. Takasugi turns beet red and yells something indistinguishable at Sakamoto, who has his arm threaded through the sleeve of Takasugi's shirt and his pants tied around his head like a bandana.

Katsura takes a photograph. 

-

The train station is empty; Katsura shivers and pulls his scarf a little tighter.

(It's just a small, backwater town, after all. There's never anyone here at this time of the day— he shouldn't have expected today to be any different.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wonder what Katsura said.  
> Today has been a day. This week has been eventful.  
> Thanks to the event organizers for hosting it. You guys are great.  
> Have a good one folks.


End file.
